East German construction industry in October 2001: Downtrend has not accelerated so far
Brigitte Loose
Wirtschaft im Wandel,
No. 15,
2001
Abstract
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Current Trends - East German Municipalities: The small(est) ones still dominate
Jens Müller
Wirtschaft im Wandel,
No. 15,
2001
Abstract
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Zum zeitlichen Wirkunsprofil bedeutender Steuerentlastungen privater Haushalte auf den privaten Konsum in Deutschland
Hans-Joachim Rudolph
IWH Discussion Papers,
No. 151,
2001
Abstract
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Rating Agency Actions and the Pricing of Debt and Equity of European Banks: What Can we Infer About Private Sector Monitoring of Bank Soundness?
Reint E. Gropp, A. J. Richards
Economic Notes,
No. 3,
2001
Abstract
The recent consultative papers by the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision has raised the possibility of an explicit role for external rating agencies in the assessment of the credit risk of banks’ assets, including interbank claims. Any judgement on the merits of this proposal calls for an assessment of the information contained in credit ratings and its relationship to other publicly available information on the financial health of banks and borrowers. We assess this issue via an event study of rating change announcements by leading international rating agencies, focusing on rating changes for European banks for which data on bond and equity prices are available. We find little evidence of announcement effects on bond prices, which may reflect the lack of liquidity in bond markets in Europe during much of our sample period. For equity prices, we find strong effects of ratings changes, although some of our results may suffer from contamination by contemporaneous news events. We also test for pre-announcement and post-announcement effects, but find little evidence of either. Overall, our results suggest that ratings agencies may perform a useful role in summarizing and obtaining non-public information on banks and that monitoring of banks’ risk through bond holders appears to be relatively limited in Europe. The relatively weak monitoring by bondholders casts some doubt on the effectiveness of a subordinated debt requirement as a supervisory tool in the European context, at least until bond markets are more developed.
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Network activities and the productivity gap in East Germany: The role of agglomeration advantages
Anita Wölfl, Joachim Ragnitz
Wirtschaft im Wandel,
No. 13,
2001
Abstract
The article presents first some theoretical considerations about the connection between productivity and networking activities of enterprises. By operationalizing networks as an agglomeration of firms in a specific region, it is argued with respect to the East German economy that such networks have not yet developped in a sufficiently matter. Additionally, a “critical“ degree of agglomeration, from which networking activities lead to higher productivity, is missing in nearly all East German regions.
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Employment in the East German environmental sector - an analysis based on the IAB Company Panel
Walter Komar
Wirtschaft im Wandel,
No. 13,
2001
Abstract
The estimations of environmental employment in this paper are based on an analysis of IAB-Firm-Panel. In 1999 182 000 man were working in production of environmental goods and services. Recording to self-assessment of firms intermediate term environmental employment will increase in environmental services sector, particulary in the field of climate protection.
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Current Trends - Decline of investment in construction industry in East Germany continues at high speed
Brigitte Loose
Wirtschaft im Wandel,
No. 13,
2001
Abstract
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Economic Slowdown reaches Central and Eastern Europe: Problematic Poland
Axel Brüggemann, Thomas Linne
Wirtschaft im Wandel,
No. 12,
2001
Abstract
Forecast for central and Eastern Europe for 2001 and 2002. Discussion of the high risk potential for financial crises in Poland as measured by the IWH early warning system and an analysis of the underlying reasons for this development.
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Innovative and international – with local personnel: Results of a survey of New Economy enterprises in Saxony and Thuringia
Cornelia Lang, Ralf Müller
Wirtschaft im Wandel,
No. 12,
2001
Abstract
BT and IT firms in Saxony and Thuringia were surveyed about their recruiting activities, the scope of their product markets and their R&D activities. The major findings are: The majority of firms engage in product and process development, their product markets are not predominantly local markets, and that they recruit their labor force in the local labor market. The latter fact is explained by the existence of the modern infrastructure in higher learning and research in the new Länder (which formerly constituted the GDR). Consequently the firms are optimistic to be also able to attract highly qualified personnel in the future.The recently enacted law, which grants a number of work permits for highly qualified jobs (green card) is therefore of no great significance to these firms.
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Measures to improve the employment prospect of welfare recipients – the view of the participients
Cornelia Lang
Wirtschaft im Wandel,
No. 12,
2001
Abstract
The results of measures to improve the employment prospects of welfare recipients are rather discouraging with respect to their core intention; many participants transit after the measure again into unemployment. Still (nevertheless) the majority of former participants surveyed by the IWH report a subjective evaluation, because the measure helped them to readjust to the daily routine of work. For many participants the ending of isolation and their regain of (improvement) of their selfesteem and self-confidence was important.
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